A touring guide to one of the finest cycling areas in the Midwest--a land of gently rolling hills, lakes and rivers, quiet roads, and historic bike trails. Minnesota, and especially the Twin Cities region, has developed an extensive network of bike paths around its lakes and along rivers--and for good reason. Cycling is one of the favorite pastimes in a state where the land is mostly flat and long winters give way to spectacular summers. With this latest addition to our well-established series, cyclists have a valuable guide to the most interesting and scenic of these urban bike paths and country roads. Included in these 25 tours is a long ride along the Root River Tail in the historic Bluffs Country of southeastern Minnesota; a four-lakes loop through Minneapolis; a gastronomic pedal through Spamtown, USA; an exploration of Mantorville, where nearly all the buildings are on the Historic Register; and a tour retracing an escape route of the infamous Jesse James gang. The tours range from 10 to 60 miles in length, from flat and urban to hilly and remote. Included with each tour is a detailed map, total mileage, complete mile-by-mile directions, and information on nearby points of interest.

Improbable, heart-wrenching, and uplifting, Jeremiah Brown’s journey from novice rower to Olympic silver medallist in under four years is a story about chasing a goal with everything you’ve got. After nearly being jailed at age seventeen and becoming a father at nineteen, Jeremiah Brown manages to grow up into a responsible young adult. But while juggling the demands of a long-term relationship, fatherhood, mortgage payments, and a nine-to-five banking career, he feels something is missing. A new goal captures his imagination: what would it take to become an Olympian? Guided by a polarizing coach, Brown and his teammates plumb the depths of physical and mental exertion in pursuit of a singular goal. The 4 Year Olympian is a story of courage, perseverance, and overcoming self-doubt, told from the perspective of an unlikely competitor.

The 2018 Winter Olympics will be the stage for many compelling stories. Athletes like Ashley Wagner and Sven Kramer are windows into hidden social phenomena, from figure skating's eating disorders to the Dutch obsession with speed skating. Controversies like the Russian doping scandal, the NHL player ban, and the question of whether North Korea will compete or disrupt are creating human drama that affects thousands of athletes. Paralympic athlete Oksana Masters' story of overcoming great odds to challenge for Olympic gold will inspire listeners. Other competitors, like Lindsey Vonn and Lizzy Yarnold, are simply living legends in the sports of downhill skiing and skeleton. Get pumped up for what's shaping up to be the most dramatic winter games ever!

For readers of The Boys in the Boat, the remarkable story of the unlikely Canadian hockey team that clinched Olympic gold in 1948 The announcement was shocking—Canada, the birthplace of hockey, would not be sending a team to the 1948 Winter Olympics in Switzerland. Outraged, a Royal Canadian Air Force squadron leader, Sandy Watson, quickly assembled a team of air force hockey players who were “amateur enough” to complete under the Olympic guidelines. Sergeant Frank Boucher was recruited to coach the team and begin the cross-Canada search for players. Hubert Brooks, a decorated flying officer and serial escapist from POW camps, was another early recruit. Andy Gilpin joined from the RCAF base in Whitehorse, as did airmen from Quebec, the Maritimes and western Canada. And when their starting goalie, Dick Ball, didn’t pass a medical exam, Murray Dowey was called up from his job as a TTC driver and occasional practice goalie for the Toronto Maple Leafs. The ragtag team got off to a rough start, losing so many exhibition games that Canadian newspapers called them a disgrace to the country. But the RCAF Flyers battled back, and Boucher’s defensive strategy paid off. They eliminated the American team, tied the Czech team and beat the Swiss as the hometown crowd pelted the Canadians with snowballs during the game. On the same ice where Barbara Ann Scott won a gold medal, the underdog RCAF Flyers also won Olympic gold, and their goalie, Murray Dowey, set an Olympic record that still stands. Against All Odds is the inspiring untold story of a group of determined men, fresh from the battlefields of WWII, who surprised a nation and the world.

Those who avidly followed the on-court acrobatics and off-court celebrity of the “Dream Team” in Barcelona in 1992 would hardly recognize what passed as basketball fifty-six years earlier, when the United States first played the game in the 1936 Olympics. In those early days of men’s Olympic basketball, many teams lacked basic skills, games were played in the pouring rain, only seven players could suit up, and the rules allowed only two substitutions and no time-outs. How this slow, low-scoring sport became the breakneck game that enraptures millions worldwide is the story of American Hoops. In this fascinating history of Olympic basketball on the world stage and behind the scenes, Carson Cunningham presents a kaleidoscopic picture of the evolution into the twenty-first century of one of America’s most popular sports. From clashes between celebrated egos and thrilling action on the court to the intense rivalries of the Cold War and technological advances in everything from television to sports equipment off the court, American Hoops follows the fortunes of Olympic basketball, in the United States and internationally, as it developed and emerged as one of the most challenging and entertaining sports in the world. Cunningham traces how the modifications made by the International Olympic Committee and the International Basketball Federation have transformed the game of basketball over the years, from the Berlin to the Beijing Olympics. His book offers a remarkable view of the changing world through the prism of Olympic sport.

For over 1,000 years, between 776 BC and AD 395, people from all over the classical world flocked every four years to Olympia in Western Greece to see famous athletes compete for the olive crowns of the ancient Olympic Games. The Games were huge, and so was the build-up: virtually the whole of the preceding year was devoted to the preparations of the site and the athletes. But these games were much more than just a sporting event: religion, power, politics, scandal, and propaganda were all at the center of the five-day festival. Held in honor of Zeus, the supreme god of Greek mythology, a visit to Olympia was also a pilgrimage to his sacred temple. In this updated edition of her indispensable guide to the ancient Games, Judith Swaddling traces their mythological and religious origins. Describing the events, the sacred ceremony, and the celebrations that were an essential part of the Olympic festival, this book paints a vivid picture of what it was like to be at these prestigious games. Concluding with a chapter on the modern Olympics that brings the story right up to the preparations for the London 2012 Games, this fascinating book is essential reading for anyone interested in the Olympics, the greatest games of them all.

Los Juegos Olímpicos de Barcelona 92, todavía considerados por muchos los mejores de la historia, cambiaron el deporte español de arriba abajo y para siempre. Veinticinco años después, en España se entrena, se compite, se organiza y se invierte en deporte según los parámetros que se fijaron entonces. Las 22 medallas que el equipo español ganó allí permanecen como un hito inigualado, pero las 17 obtenidas en Río 2016 son herencia directa de la semilla allí plantada.Barcelona 92 explica las claves de aquel éxito y de la fabulosa transformación experimentada por la Ciudad Condal gracias a los juegos. Un equipo de periodistas de la Agencia EFE interpreta aquella cita desde todos sus ángulos, con testimonios inéditos de sus protagonistas. Deportistas legendarios como Fermín Cacho, Kiko Narváez, José Manuel Moreno, Miriam Blasco, Juan Antonio San Epifanio o Antonio Rebollo; artistas como Montserrat Caballé, Javier Mariscal o Los Manolos; dirigentes como Juan Antonio Samaranch o Javier Gómez Navarro; y personajes anónimos como los voluntarios o el botones del hotel en el que se alojó el Dream Team desvelan sus recuerdos de aquellos juegos, junto a datos y anécdotas nunca antes conocidos.

A lively account of the 1936 Olympics told through the voices and stories of those who witnessed it, from an award-winning historian and biographer Berlin 1936 takes the reader through the sixteen days of the Olympiad, describing the events in the German capital through the eyes of a select cast of characters--Nazi leaders and foreign diplomats, sportsmen and journalists, writers and socialites, nightclub owners and jazz musicians. While the events in the Olympic stadium, such as when an American tourist breaks through the security and manages to kiss Hitler, provide the focus and much of the drama, it also considers the lives of ordinary Berliners--the woman with a dark secret who steps in front of a train, the transsexual waiting for the Gestapo's knock on the door, and the Jewish boy fearing for his future and hoping that Germany loses on the playing field. During the games the Nazi dictatorship was in many ways put on hold, and Berlin 1936 offers a last glimpse of the vibrant and diverse life in the German capital in the 1920s and 30s that the Nazis wanted to destroy.

A comprehensive history of the 1936 Berlin Olympics offers a provocative look at the Nazi machine that attempted to use the games as a demonstration of Aryan superiority, while hiding its anti-Semitic and militaristic agenda, and at the politicians, diplomats, and Olympic officials whose own power struggle would have profound consequences for the world. Reprint. 20,000 first printing.

Traces the story of an American rowing team from the University of Washington that defeated elite rivals at Hitler's 1936 Berlin Olympics, sharing the experiences of such contributors as their enigmatic coach, a visionary boat builder and a homeless teen rower. By the author of Under a Flaming Sky. (sports & recreation). Simultaneous.